John Scott once wrote: “We are not to picture Jesus as a modern baby lying with nothing on but a diaper…but as a baby in ‘swaddling cloths,’ the long narrow strips of bandage wrapped round his limbs and body making free movement impossible…Is it not almost unbelievable that the Creator, on whose freedom and power we all depend, should allow himself to be bound, and to lie in helpless weakness in the straw?”

The true message of Christmas is that God was born into our world naked, defenseless, and vulnerable. How ironic then is our consumeristic perversion of it!

The Messiah, bound in a feeding troth—while December shopping malls exhibit a celebration of our capitalistic freedom to make and spend as much money as we desire.

The Savior of the World, born in a barn to peasants—while our homes and tables exhibit an extravagant excessiveness associated with royalty.

God, humbled, emptied and poured out—while Christians use Christmas to exert their power, control and authority, especially over others who have different faiths.

Christmas challenges us to acknowledge that God’s ways are not our ways. While we perceive Christmas as an opportunity to get our own way, through the true message of Christmas I believe God is trying to show us another way.

This is why I believe it is so important to attend and invite others to our worship services and activities during Advent and Christmas. For amid the clamor of consumerism and selfishness, in our worship we will hear a call to sacrifice and selflessness. Amid the noise of narcissism and pride, through our acts servitude we will sing carols of humility and sharing.

And may the world look at us and see not a Crusader born with a silver spoon in his mouth and a sword in his hand, but a baby whose limbs were bound and whose bed was straw.